Charleston County · County Council Finance Committee
💬 Council members question library content policies and youth access to books
Council members pressed Executive Director Angela Craig about whether age-inappropriate books are accessible to children, with Darby listing specific challenged titles, including books in the LGBTQ genre and young-adult novels such as Looking for Alaska. Craig confirmed two titles were removed entirely from the collection, several books will be moved from the children's section to a new parent collection in adult non-fiction by the end of 2026, and that the library is in full compliance with state Proviso 271, backed by letters from the South Carolina State Library. Craig defended the policy requiring full-book review before a challenge is acted upon, citing federal best practices for evaluating literature as a whole.

Isle of Palms · Public Services & Facilities Committee
🌊 Committee approves flood barrier study and facilities upgrades amid beach project weather delays
The committee unanimously approved just under $42,000 for a Phase 3 Waterway Boulevard flood barrier survey and study, swapped a budgeted pump for a $10,350 public works trailer, and authorized $35,000 in recreation center AV upgrades. Staff delivered extensive updates on a stalled beach renourishment project where three weeks of rough seas are threatening an end-of-November environmental permit deadline, as well as marina dredging and bulkhead recoating work targeted for the winter. The December committee meeting was left tentative, with a decision point set around November 23–24.

Town of Kiawah Island · Planning Commission
🏗️ 13,000-square-foot civic and cultural center expansion clears planning commission
The commission unanimously recommended approval of planned development amendment REZ26-0000004, allowing a 13,000-square-foot expansion of the existing Town Hall to include an auditorium, meeting rooms, lobby, and trail connections, with a 10-year completion requirement replacing the original 50-year phasing timeline. The amendment also folds in the town's newly acquired adjacent parcel at 445 Betsy Kerrrison Parkway (parcel 204000025, approximately 2.7 acres, subject to a Lowcountry Conservancy conservation easement) as it proceeds through annexation from unincorporated Charleston County. Building height allowance increases to 50 feet for the auditorium; the mayor indicated approximately $15 million is allocated to the current project, with an additional $1.2 million already spent on the adjacent parcel.

City of North Charleston · Zoning Board of Appeals
📋 UDO Module One released for public comment ahead of January 2027 map delivery
Planning and Zoning Director Tim McCall confirms that Module One of the city's new Unified Development Ordinance, covering new districts and land uses, is publicly available at onorthcharleston.com for community commentary. A zoning map has not yet been prepared; McCall states the city does not yet know the geographic placement of the new districts, with the map anticipated in January 2027. A Spanish-language virtual outreach session drew at least 20 participants, and the city commits to continued direct community engagement through the drafting process.

City of Charleston · Board of Zoning Appeals – Site Design
🏙️ Major Upper Peninsula mixed-use hotel project clears protected-tree variance 4-1
The BZA-SD approved a variance to remove 21 protected trees at 1142 Morrison Drive to allow a large mixed-use development including a hotel, residential, retail, and office buildings over a parking deck. The board added conditions requiring an arborist to evaluate all 21 protected trees for transplant feasibility and a good-faith effort to find city-approved relocation sites. The project still faces BAR review, an accommodations overlay hearing, and TRC scrutiny before construction can proceed.

City of Charleston · Resilience and Sustainability Advisory Committee
🌳 RELIEF tree planting program launches December 5 in Westside neighborhood
The city's RELIEF urban forestry initiative will officially launch on December 5, 2026 at 8:00 a.m. at Mitchell Playground, coinciding with South Carolina Arbor Day. The launch targets the Westside neighborhood, which has only 19.4% tree canopy coverage, identified through GIS mapping by city urban forestry staff and RDE Robinson Design Engineers. The program is led in partnership with the Westside Neighborhood Association and president Sarah Spangler, with plans to replicate the model in other underserved neighborhoods.

Two separate efforts are underway to change Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966: a Senate bill introduced September 30, 2026, and a rewrite of federal regulations by the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation (ACHP).

A procedural Senate vote is scheduled for November 9, 2026. However, this is not a direct vote on the Section 106 provisions. Senators are expected to vote on whether to advance H.R. 2347, a legislative vehicle that could be used for broader permitting-reform legislation.

Section 106 requires federal agencies to consider how federally funded, licensed, permitted, or approved projects may affect historic properties. It covers more than buildings. Historic districts, archaeological sites, traditional cultural places, sacred landscapes, and other properties eligible for the National Register of Historic Places can qualify.

Under the current process, federal agencies generally identify potentially affected historic properties, assess impacts, consult with preservation authorities and other parties, and provide opportunities for public involvement.

Section 106 does not give preservation groups or communities an automatic veto. Federal projects can still proceed despite adverse effects. The process requires that potential harm be considered before the federal decision is made.

The ACHP effort and the Senate bill target different things and work differently.

The ACHP effort would rewrite 36 CFR Part 800, the procedures used to implement the law. As of November 6, 2026, the proposed rule had not been published for public comment. The text could change during subsequent rulemaking.

The Senate bill would change the National Historic Preservation Act itself. Changes made in statute would require new legislation to reverse, which limits what future regulations could restore. The ACHP process could continue even if the Senate bill fails.

S. 5653, the Bipartisan American Affordability and Jobs Act of 2026, is a broad permitting-reform package. Its historic-preservation provisions are in Division B, Title III, Section 2301. READ THE FULL BILL HERE

The bill was introduced by Senators Shelley Moore Capito (R, West Virginia), the bill's official sponsor and chair of the Environment and Public Works Committee; Mike Lee (R, Utah), chair of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee; Sheldon Whitehouse (D, Rhode Island), ranking Democrat on Environment and Public Works; and Martin Heinrich (D, New Mexico), ranking Democrat on Energy and Natural Resources.

The Section 106 language sits in the Energy and Natural Resources portion of the bill.

The main proposed changes are:

The judicial-review changes are particularly consequential.

Under the proposed language, a court finding that a federal agency violated the NHPA generally could not vacate the agency's approval or issue an injunction stopping the project on that basis. Instead, the court would remand the matter to the agency without invalidating the approval.

That means a court could determine that an agency failed to comply with historic-preservation requirements while the underlying project approval remained in effect.

The proposal would not eliminate every possible legal remedy or legal challenge under other applicable laws. However, it would substantially restrict the remedies available for NHPA violations.

The bill also contains provisions that supporters consider improvements, including an increased Historic Preservation Fund authorization and support for Tribal Historic Preservation Offices.

All of these are proposed changes, not existing law.

The public record identifies the four senators above. It does not identify the staff members or outside organizations that drafted the final text of Section 2301.

On October 29, 2025, the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee held a hearing on the Section 106 consultation process.

Andy McDonald, an environmental compliance manager with Montana-Dakota Utilities, testified on behalf of the Edison Electric Institute, the trade association for investor-owned electric utilities.

His testimony advocated narrowing the review process, particularly for electric transmission projects with limited federal involvement.

Several of his recommendations resemble provisions later included in S. 5653.

He recommended focusing review on direct alterations, which resembles the narrower adverse-effect definitions. He recommended requiring a closer causal connection, which resembles a "reasonably foreseeable effects" standard. He recommended excluding speculative and remote effects, which resembles the bill's express limits on certain effects. And he recommended reducing uncertainty for transmission projects, which resembles the bill's exclusions and expedited procedures.

A federal lobbying disclosure covering July through September 2026 reported approximately $1.63 million in total lobbying expenditures by the Edison Electric Institute and listed S. 5653 among its legislative interests.

That figure covers the organization's overall lobbying in the period, not spending specific to Section 106.

These facts do not show that the Edison Electric Institute wrote the legislation. Some of these concepts also come from broader federal environmental-permitting policy.

The ACHP rewrite raises its own authorship questions.

ACHP meeting materials from early 2026 indicated that the administration and members of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee had provided input on Section 106.

The Society for American Archaeology later raised concerns about the role of outside counsel in preparing the regulatory proposal.

Cultural Heritage Partners filed a Freedom of Information Act request for draft documents, author information, tracked changes, and communications involving ACHP leadership and administration officials.

Still unresolved are who drafted the ACHP proposal, whether industry representatives reviewed it, and whether the regulatory and legislative drafting efforts were coordinated.

The two efforts have not been shown to share an author.

Electric utilities, transmission developers, and energy companies argue that lengthy federal reviews raise construction costs, financing uncertainty, and delays.

A transmission line can cross multiple jurisdictions, private parcels, federal lands, and culturally significant areas.

Supporters argue that extensive historic-property review for projects with limited federal involvement can be a disproportionate burden.

The proposed changes would make some projects easier to approve, particularly those in existing utility corridors.

Road builders and transportation organizations argue that federal review procedures delay highway, transit, and other publicly funded projects.

The American Public Transportation Association and transportation-construction organizations support the broader legislation, citing more predictable review schedules.

The National Association of Home Builders supports the broader legislation, arguing that delays and regulatory costs contribute to housing expenses.

Most residential construction does not independently trigger Section 106, and the preservation provisions would not directly remove zoning restrictions, local architectural review, building codes, or subdivision approval requirements.

Data centers need significant electricity and supporting infrastructure, and expanded generation and transmission can involve federal permitting and historic review.

The available research does not establish that data-center companies requested the Section 106 provisions.

Supporters also make a broader policy argument: delayed transmission can raise costs and slow reliability improvements, and some Section 106 reviews may duplicate other federal processes.

The National Trust for Historic Preservation acknowledges the need for more efficient federal permitting but opposes the historic-preservation provisions as drafted.

Its October 2026 statements identify four principal concerns: narrower reviews, weaker consultation, greater unilateral agency authority, and restrictions on judicial review.

Opponents argue that Section 106 can surface resources that agencies do not already know about, and that it gives communities a chance to explain why a landscape, neighborhood, archaeological site, or cultural place matters.

For Tribal Nations, opponents raise a specific concern.

A site can be significant because of ceremonies, oral traditions, ancestral connections, or burial grounds, and may not be visible through a conventional architectural survey.

Opponents say that narrowing review to direct physical alterations risks missing some of those impacts.

They also argue that the bill's Tribal participation and funding provisions do not adequately preserve the existing consultation process.

The proposed judicial-review restrictions raise another concern.

Under current law, courts can, in appropriate circumstances, provide remedies that prevent a project from proceeding before an agency corrects a legal violation.

The bill would generally prevent courts from vacating approvals or issuing injunctions based on NHPA violations, even when a violation is established.

Opponents argue that this would weaken the practical enforceability of Section 106 because an agency could be directed to correct its process without the underlying approval being invalidated.

Several Charleston projects illustrate how Section 106 consultation has played a role in federal decisions involving historic resources.

These examples demonstrate what the existing process has accomplished. They do not establish that the same projects would have been decided differently under S. 5653.

Determining that would require applying the proposed statutory language to each project's federal approvals and historic-property findings.

In the late 1970s, plans called for a 419-room, nine-story hotel near King and Market streets.

Federal funding tied to land acquisition triggered Section 106 review.

The ACHP traveled to Charleston in January 1979 to hear public testimony.

A 1979 agreement reduced the hotel from nine stories to eight, scaled the project to fit the historic district, preserved and rehabilitated the first 40 feet of nine historic Meeting Street buildings, and committed the city to a tourism management plan.

The hotel opened in 1986.

The original highway proposal included a connection that would have directed traffic onto Broad Street in the historic district.

During Section 106 review, preservation concerns and public opposition helped produce a different alignment, connecting farther north at Calhoun Street.

Historic Charleston Foundation estimates the Broad Street connection could have added approximately 20,000 vehicles a day.

That is the foundation's estimate, not an independently verified count.

The historical evidence does not establish that Section 106 alone caused the change.

In 1980, the General Services Administration proposed a modern courthouse addition near the Four Corners of Law.

Preservation advocates objected to its scale and potential effect on nearby historic resources, including St. Michael's Church and City Hall.

Through consultation and continued opposition, the design changed.

The final arrangement preserved an existing park, relocated and redesigned the annex, and reduced its visual impact.

Under S. 5653, some visual effects would face a higher threshold before qualifying as adverse.

The city's Battery Extension and storm-protection planning involves federal participation and ongoing historic-preservation consultation.

According to Historic Charleston Foundation, the design has moved from a utilitarian, military-style floodwall concept toward a scenic linear park intended to address flooding while respecting the historic waterfront.

That change should not be attributed solely to Section 106. Engineering requirements, city decisions, and public input may also have contributed.

Local protections such as the Board of Architectural Review, historic-district rules, zoning requirements, and other applicable state and federal environmental laws would not automatically end if S. 5653 became law.

However, local requirements cannot always substitute for federal consultation, particularly for projects involving federal agencies, transportation infrastructure, or resources outside local historic-district boundaries.

Preservation advocates report that approximately 120,000 federal undertakings go through Section 106 consideration each year, with only a small percentage resulting in adverse-effect findings, and cite average review times measured in days.

These figures should be attributed to their original sources and evaluated according to their methodology.

A project's total permitting time is not the same as the time attributable to Section 106. Engineering, financing, environmental analysis, land acquisition, litigation, and other permits can all contribute.

On Monday, November 9, 2026, the Senate is scheduled to hold a procedural vote at approximately 5:30 p.m. Eastern on cloture for the motion to proceed to H.R. 2347, the Survivor Justice Tax Prevention Act.

Although that bill has a different title, it is being used as a potential legislative vehicle for a broader permitting-reform package.

The November 9 vote is not a direct vote on S. 5653, nor is it a final vote on the Section 106 changes.

A successful cloture vote would advance the procedural process for considering the legislative vehicle. It would not, by itself, enact the historic-preservation provisions.

The ultimate legislation could still change through negotiations, amendments, subsequent Senate votes, or House consideration.

The ACHP's proposed regulatory rewrite is a separate process that can continue regardless of the Senate outcome.

Once the proposed rule is published in the Federal Register, its text, public-comment deadline, and participation options will need to be confirmed. Until then, the formal public-comment period is not open, although participation through other administrative channels, such as an OIRA meeting, may be possible.

Residents, preservation organizations, Tribal Nations, businesses, and local governments can contact congressional offices about the legislation.

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